My Shadow is a Trickster
Freya's had a unruly, unhelpful, utterly unstoppable shadow, the problem with a shadow is that it's supposed to be you. It's supposed to be your silent partner, your faithful, light-blocking friend. A perfectly reflection of the light you interrupt. For Freya, a shadow was something else entirely. It was a chaotic, independent entity. It was an opinionated dark smudge with a knack for causing havoc. It was a prankster and it was going to destroy her life. Freya, at ten years old, was the precise opposite of her shadow. Freya was quiet and she was precise. Her goal in life was simple: to slide through each day unnoticed, like a soft breeze. Her favourite colour was grey (the colour of being invisible) If her colour was grey her shadow's was black.
Her favourite hobby was reading (an activity that kept her still). If Freya could have chosen a superpower, it wouldn't be flight or super-strength. It would be fading into the background. So, when her family moved, away from the comfort of her old bedroom, the predictable creaks of her old floorboards and the classmates who already knew she was quiet and she found herself staring at the brick facade of St Margaret's School, Freya felt a wave of cold dread. A new school meant new eyes. New eyes meant everyone would be looking at her. It was her absolute worst nightmare. And her shadow knew it. On that first Monday, as she stood nervously outside the school gates, the sun was bright and her shadow was, unfortunately, fully materialised.
Freya took a deep breath, adjusted her backpack straps and smoothed her favourite (grey) cardigan. Be invisible, she told herself. Just blend in. As she stepped toward the school entrance, her shadow did not walk. It didn't glide. It moonwalked. It did a smooth, sliding backward motion that would have made a 1980s pop star proud. It threw in a little head-spin for good measure. "Mum!" Freya hissed, stopping dead and staring at her feet. "Make it stop! Look at what it's doing!" Her mother, who was busy trying to wrestle a coffee and a car keys, glanced down. Freya's shadow was now standing perfectly still, its feet aligned with Freya's, its posture as stiff and nervous as hers. "Sweetheart, it's just a shadow," her mum said, offering a tired, sympathetic smile.
"You're just nervous. Shadows can't do things. Now go! You're going to be late! Have a wonderful first day!" Freya walked into the school, a dark, dancing chaos following two steps behind her. The nightmare truly began in Mrs. Gable's classroom, she was a woman who valued order. She had charts for everything: a charting for pencil sharpening, a chart for quiet walking and a chart for bathroom breaks. Freya's goal was clear: be so compliant and silent that she became a permanent fixture of the room, like a desk or a very reliable clock. When Freya was introduced, she was told to "stand up and tell the class a fun fact about you." Freya dreaded "fun facts." They were never actually fun. They were facts that invited people to form opinions about you.
She stood. "My... name is Freya," she squeaked, her voice barely a whisper. "And my fun fact is... I moved here from Sheffield." This was safe. Moving from Sheffield was a neutral, geographically sound fact. Nobody could judge her for having once lived in Sheffield. As she stood, however, the sun streamed through the large classroom windows, hitting her from the side and casting a long, dark replica onto the white dry-erase board behind her. As Freya spoke, her shadow was not standing still. Her shadow was, quite deliberately, using two fingers to make bunny ears directly above the shadowed head of Mrs. Gable. The entire class erupted in giggles. Mrs. Gable, completely oblivious, looked around, confused. "Class, please!" Mrs. Gable scolded.
"We are listening to Freya." "And... I like to read," Freya finished, trying to sound firm but feeling her cheeks turn the colour of a fire engine. As she said "read," her shadow mime-read a book, only it held the book upside down, then pretended to sneeze, making the shadow-book fly into the air. The giggles turned into full-on laughter. Freya sat down so fast she nearly missed her chair. She buried her face in her arms. This was it. The official end of her social life before it had even begun. She was the weird new girl whose shadow was a comedian. The next few weeks were a relentless battle. At recess, when Freya tried to sit on the edge of the playground and quietly sketch, her shadow would grab a shadow-rock and pretend to juggle.
When she stood in the lunch line, her shadow would tap the person next to her on the shoulder. When that person turned around and saw only Freya (who was, as always, looking intently at her shoelaces), they'd look at her as if she were a ghost, or a weirdo, or both. The worst, though, was Leo. Leo was the designated class clown, but he wasn't a comedian. He was a commentator. He had a voice that was both loud and nasal, and he used it to narrate everything. "Wow, check it out!" Leo shouted during science class. Freya was standing, explaining (to the floor) how a terrarium worked. "The new girl's shadow is doing the macarena! Look at those hips!" The whole class turned. It was true. Her shadow was doing the macarena, with surprising rhythm.
"Freya!" Mrs. Gable's voice was like a whip. "Could you please stand still?" "I am standing still!" Freya cried, a single tear escaping. This was the first time she had spoken above a whisper. After class, she found Leo cornering her in the hallway. "Hey," he said, and his voice wasn't loud or nasal. It was curious. "That was pretty cool back there. How do you do that shadow thing? Are you a magician?" Freya stared at him. Was this a trick? "It just does it," she mumbled. Leo leaned in; eyes wide. "So, it has, like, a mind of its own? That's epic. We should do something with that." "I don't want to do anything with it," Freya said, her voice shaking. "I just want it to be normal." The next month, the school announced the Annual Talent Show.
This was the pinnacle of the school year. Winning the talent show didn't just give you a plastic trophy; it gave you legendary status that lasted until college. Leo, of course, signed up immediately. He was going to perform "The Art of the Burp," which involved burping the alphabet. Mrs. Gable made sure the entire class was aware of the importance of the event. "We expect participation!" she'd announce, tapping her marker against the dry-erase board. "Show us what makes you special!" Freya had zero interest in showing anyone what made her special. She signed up to be on the "Stage Crew." Her job would be to operate the curtains and, hopefully, blend so perfectly into the black velvet drapes that no one would ever know she was there.
The day of the try-outs arrived. The gym smelled like sweat and nervous energy. Freya was backstage, positioned by the massive rope pulley that controlled the main curtain. She felt safe here, in the shadows (ironically). Leo went up. His "Art of the Burp" was exactly as advertised. He got to 'Q' before running out of air. A girl named Chloe sang a pop song while doing gymnastics, which was technically impressive but very confusing to watch. A boy named David played the recorder with his nose. Then, there was a gap. One of the acts, "The Amazing Arthur" (a magician), had come down with the chickenpox. The gym fell into an awkward silence. Mrs. Gable, who was running the auditions, looked around frantically. "Is there... anyone else? Any late sign-ups?
Anyone who has... a talent they're hiding?" Her eyes landed on Freya. Freya froze, gripping the thick rope. Please don't see me, please don't see me. As Freya willed herself to become invisible, the overhead stage lights (the special, hot, bright "audition lights") came on. They hit Freya, and her shadow was thrown with dramatic clarity onto the centre-stage curtain. Her shadow didn't just stand there. Oh, no. It looked like it had been waiting for its moment in the spotlight. Her shadow dropped to one knee, extended an arm, and belted out a dramatic, silent opera solo. It held a high note that must have been twenty feet tall. Then, it did a series of perfectly synchronised, silent tap-dance moves. The gym went quiet. Then, slowly, the applause started.
It wasn't the polite applause the other kids got. This was the real, "holy cow, did you see that?" applause. "Freya!" Mrs. Gable gasped, her ordered universe momentarily cracked. "What... what was that?" "I was just... standing here," Freya said, her voice barely a thread. "No, you weren't!" Leo shouted from the audience. "Your shadow! It did a whole dance! It was incredible!" "Freya, you must sign up!" Mrs. Gable declared. "We haven't had a shadow-dancer since 2008, and that was a boy with a cardboard cutout." "I can't!" Freya squeaked. "I don't dance! I'm on the stage crew! I pull the ropes!" "You just did dance!" Chloe yelled, her pigtails bobbing. "We all saw it!" Freya was trapped. She could not admit her shadow had a mind of its own.
Everyone would think she was a complete loon. But she also couldn't dance. She was as un-coordinated as a newborn giraffe. That night, in her bedroom, the moonlight created a soft, greyish version of her shadow on the wall. Freya stood, feeling a profound sense of despair. "You," she said, pointing a finger at the wall, "are a monster. You are trying to ruin everything. Why can't you just be a regular shadow?" The shadow, which usually had a response for everything, did nothing. It stood still. It looked… deflated. Freya sat on her bed, pulling her knees to her chest. She had signed up for the talent show. There was no way out. The audition had set a standard she couldn't possibly meet. "What am I going to do?" she whispered into the empty room.
Then, she felt a strange, subtle change. A warm, confident feeling washed over her, a feeling she had only ever experienced in her own mind when she was alone. It was the feeling of being brave. She looked back at the wall. The shadow had moved. It wasn't dancing or pranking. It was sitting cross-legged on the floor, its posture perfectly mirroring Freya's, but its small, shadow-hand was reaching out and gently tapping the spot on the wall where Freya's shadow-hand would be if she reached out. Maybe... Freya thought. Maybe it's not a monster. She stood up. "Okay," she said. "If we're going to do this, we have to do it together. I can't dance. At all. I will fall on my face. But... maybe you can?" The shadow nodded.
It was the most distinct, slow nod. Then, it pointed one long, dark finger at Freya and then at itself. Then, it did a tiny, precise spin. "You want to teach me?" Freya asked. The shadow nodded again. For the next two weeks, Freya didn't sleep much. Every night, with the help of a desk lamp and her bedroom wall, Freya had a dance rehearsal with her shadow. It was not graceful. Freya tripped over her own feet constantly. She knocked over a lamp. She nearly cracked her head on her desk. But her shadow was the most patient dance instructor in the world. When she got frustrated and sat on the floor, ready to quit, the shadow would do a goofy, wobbly walk to make her laugh. When she finally got a spin right, the shadow would do a double-backflip in celebration.
Freya started to see a pattern. The shadow wasn't just doing random things. Its wildest moves, the ones that had caused all the trouble, always happened when Freya was feeling the most scared. The macarena during science? That was when Freya was terrified of speaking. The opera solo at the audition? That was when she wanted to fade into the drapes. The shadow was her bravery. It was her wild, loud, confident, silly side, the side she spent every waking second trying to suppress. Her shadow wasn't trying to embarrass her. It was trying to liberate her. She had to teach it to control its timing, though. "Okay," she'd tell it. "No more bunny ears behind teachers. It's funny, I get it, but it's not strategic. We save the big moves for the show.
The day of the Talent Show arrived. The gym was packed. The air hummed with excitement and nervousness. Leo performed first. He successfully burped the entire alphabet, including 'Z'. He even managed a few burp-chords. The applause was thunderous. Leo was the clear favourite. Chloe sang and tumbled. David played his nose-recorder. Then, a hush fell. The special "spotlight" was wheeled out. This was not the simple audition light; this was the big, bright, slightly-terrifying professional light that was reserved for the main acts. It created shadows so sharp and clear you could practically read their thoughts. Freya stood in the wings. She was wearing a simple, dark blue dress. Her heart felt like a bird trapped in a cage.
She was about to step out in front of the entire school. Her hands were shaking. She felt that old, familiar urge to dissolve. To become grey. To become invisible. Suddenly, she felt that warm, confident feeling again. The feeling of her shadow. Her bravery. She took a deep breath. Okay. We've practiced this. We are a team. She stepped onto the stage. The heat of the spotlight was intense. It created a colossal, dark shadow of Freya on the huge white sheet that had been hung as a backdrop. For the first ten seconds, Freya just stood there. She did nothing. She willed her body to be perfectly still. The audience began to whisper. Had she frozen? Was this the weird new girl just being weird? Behind her, on the sheet, her shadow was also perfectly still.
It was the first time in a month that Freya and her shadow had been in complete, perfect sync. The music started, a fast-paced, jaunty, electro-swing tune. Freya didn't move. But her shadow did. Her shadow kicked up one heel. Then another. Then it did a Charleston step. Then a spin. It was the choreography they had practiced, only better. More defined. More joyous. The audience gasped. Now, it was Freya's turn. This was the key. She couldn't just stand there; she had to be part of the performance. She began to move, too. Freya was not a good dancer. Her moves were slightly stiff, her spins a little wobbly. But she didn't just walk; she tried. She made eye contact with her shadow. She mimed things, and the shadow mimed them back.
If she pointed a finger, her shadow would turn that finger into a rocket ship launching. If she hopped, her shadow would jump ten feet in the air. The audience didn't see the clumsy ten-year-old. They saw a duet. They saw an impossibly perfect interaction between a girl and her other self. It was a visual comedy sketch. It was magic. Freya felt her fear start to evaporate, replaced by a strange, soaring joy. She wasn't trying to hide. She was letting her wild, brave, silly side out. She was being seen, and it didn't feel terrifying. It felt amazing. The finale of their act involved Freya doing a clumsy, flailing spin that ended with her arms outstretched, looking terrified, while her shadow, in perfect visual juxtaposition, did a massive, confident, star-jump.
The gym didn't just applaud. They roared. The sound was deafening. The standing ovation started instantly. Leo, who was in the front row, stood on his chair, yelling "YES! SHADOW POWER!" When the music ended, and the spotlight clicked off, Freya was breathing hard. The gym was quiet again, the kind of quiet that means people are in awe. For the first time in her life, Freya didn't feel grey. She didn't feel invisible. She felt visible. She felt brilliant. The plastic trophy (a golden microphone) was awarded to "Leo, the Alphabet Burper," but that didn't matter. Not to Freya. She had done something far better. She had won the battle against her own fear. Later, as she walked out to the school bus, she stopped to say goodbye to Leo.
"Man, that was epic," Leo said, his voice actually full of respect. "We still need to do that magician thing. I can be your assistant. I can burp your intro music." "Maybe," Freya smiled. A real, wide smile. As she stepped onto the bus, she looked down. The low sun cast a very long shadow that stretched away from her, toward the other kids, toward the playground, toward the life she had been too scared to live. Her shadow didn't moonwalk. It didn't make bunny ears. It just was. A long, dark, faithful reminder that she was never, ever, truly alone, and that her bravery was always just one spotlight away.
